Tipping boat captain?? Help, please!!

[CDoobee]

Hi,
I'm not sure if this is the correct board for this question, but I couldn't figure out where else to put it!

We are going in September. There will be 8 of us and since we qualify as a Grand Gathering, we are doing a couple of the GG events. The question I have regards tipping. We are doing the Magical Fireworks Voyage, and we are not sure how much to tip our boat captain, and if there is anyone else involved that we would need to tip? There are characters involved and I know we don't tip them!

The cost is $43.99/adult and $24.99/child. Should we tip a percentage of the total, and if so, what % is customary?

If anyone has participated in this before and can help me, I'd greatly appreciate it!!!

 

[TwiddleDeeTwiddleDum]

Tipping is always a personal decision but for us, when we rented a pontoon to watch wishes for our group of 6 adults & 4 kids we tipped the driver well above the 20% we paid to rent it - why? because he gave excellent service & even when he was taking us back to GF afterwards by coincidence we were able to see that electric light water parade which nobody had ever seen & he intentionally drove very slowly by it for the kids to oou and ahh over it. He was great & we will always remember that magical evening.

 

[travelin' tigger]

Never done a grand gathering cruise, but I always tipped 20-25% for my past Illuminations cruises.

HTH!!

 

[CDoobee]

Thank you both! That sounds reasonable. We'll probably go with the 20%.

Thanks again!

 

[shellybaxter]

While we tipped our Wishes captian ($20 if I remember right) we did not tip our GG fireworks captian. Kind of like we tip the taxi driver but don't tip the Disney bus driver. If they are doing a service "just for us" we tip - if the service provided (like captaining a bus for a lot of other families too) is for lots of people then we don't tip. Not sure if that's the way others do it - its just the way we do it.

 

[CDoobee]

While we tipped our Wishes captian ($20 if I remember right) we did not tip our GG fireworks captian. Kind of like we tip the taxi driver but don't tip the Disney bus driver. If they are doing a service "just for us" we tip - if the service provided (like captaining a bus for a lot of other families too) is for lots of people then we don't tip. Not sure if that's the way others do it - its just the way we do it.

Thanks. That's something to think about also! Anyone know how many people fit on the boat for the GG Fireworks Cruise? Our group is 8 people, not sure how big the boat is or how many others will fit on there.

 

[Cheshire Figment]

I have a friend who is one of the Captains for the Epcot pontoon boats. He says most people tend to tip in the 15%-20% range.

Normally the Captains for the Grand Gathering Wishes Cruise don't get tipped as the capacity of those boats is close to 100 people and they don't get the personal service that the smaller boats have. Also, he said they are paid a lot more than the small boat people.

 

[CDoobee]

I have a friend who is one of the Captains for the Epcot pontoon boats. He says most people tend to tip in the 15%-20% range.

Normally the Captains for the Grand Gathering Wishes Cruise don't get tipped as the capacity of those boats is close to 100 people and they don't get the personal service that the smaller boats have. Also, he said they are paid a lot more than the small boat people.

Thank, Cheshire! Very good to know!